Yeah, I'd thought about the whole surface area stepdown method but volumes would indeed get larger... I'll prolly end up making a cascading valve piloted by a homemade schrader/hammer valve........

And I'm still playing with some other ideas as well...like a heavier duty qev piston... a sear released piston for the pilot piston....

If you figure the chamber as 1.5" and the pilot tube as .25", at 1000psi there is only 49lbs of force acting on the seared pilot piston, And I have no idea how that compares to a firing pin/sear in a rifle in lbs acting.... And by using a spring to reset the pilot piston it negates the need for a rod for reseting.... And I'm sure that .25" pilot vent is PLENTY...